Debate over crash

Waddington was driving between 30 and 40mph and witnesses saw his Peugeot veering from side to side in the moments before the crash.

Later neurology tests ruled out that he had had a stroke at the wheel, but he said he can normally tell if he is feeling drowsy after having wine.

After the incident he said if he had dozed off, it would have been suddenly, in a way that has never happened before. As a result he handed in his licence to the DVLA.

There was also a debate in court as to whether he had been warned in 2012 that he should stop driving.

His wife had asked him to attend a sleep apnoea clinic because of his snoring, and a letter sent by the clinic to his GP appeared to recommend that he shouldn’t drive.

But defence solicitor David Barton said Waddington received no instruction to stop driving. If he had received such instruction he would have faced the more severe charge of causing death by dangerous driving.

Mr Barton pointed out that there was no evidence to suggest that his client had taken the wrong medication, or that his treatment for sleep apnoea in 2012 had any bearing on the crash.

He stated: “Any suggestion there is a history that might have contributed to this is completely incorrect. There is no suggestion that Mr Waddington was ever told that he should not drive.

“He is scrupulously honest and would not have put himself into a dangerous situation as a driver.”

The scene of the crash in in Cranbrook Road, Tenterden